


Fight For Me

by indefensibleselfindulgence



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, Body Horror, Canon Typical Weirdness, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Mutual Pining, Other, Other Additional Tags to Be Added
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-21
Updated: 2019-03-26
Packaged: 2019-11-27 05:35:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,204
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18190430
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/indefensibleselfindulgence/pseuds/indefensibleselfindulgence
Summary: Her life is a joke.Which, in any other circumstance would be worse then it is now. Because it's infuriating, and infuriating is good. It's a rush of adrenaline that can save her or save Basira and that's good because she's being useful, she's doing her part. She could have killed Elias when she had the chance but that's neither here nor there.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> i wanted to finish the entire thing for today but finals you know 
> 
> not beta'd

If she doesn't die, it'll be a miracle if she ever gets the stench out. 

Iron and rot stick to her hair, to her clothes, to her skin, the scent so far up her nostrils no amount of showers, of soap, of perfume, will ever hide this again. She's ankle deep in viscous fat, and her boots are ruined. Melanie knows that Hopworth is further down the hall, but the knives in her hands threaten to slip out. 

Every movement is labored now- her muscles ache in a way that they haven't since she was still in school and had to run from rich bullies. God- if they could see her now. The smile creeps onto her face, and she doesn't resent it for once. Thinking about them forces more adrenaline through her system, and the ache in her bones ebbs away for the moment. 

There's something nice about having so many things she could get angry about. 

She pushes her stained sleeves up with the knife handle and rubs her face as clean as she can on her forearm. 

Melanie steps forward, the sickening squelch of human crunching under her boot. Ugh. Lukas isn't going to comp her dry cleaning. She's never going to feel clean again. Rich kids who taunted her for second-hand clothes. Have to defend this shit hole in the first place. One foot in front of the other until she's standing in the main hall and can see-

Jesus Christ that's not what a person is supposed to look like. 

One step in front of the other until she's just a few feet away and Hopworth notices and his laughter sinks all the way into Melanie's guts, and she hates him for making her listen to it. The immediate hatred drives her first knife into what was maybe an arm once. 

She stabs and hacks and gets covered head to toe in a new coat of red. Some of it gets into her mouth, and it takes everything in her to just drive the knife deeper. There's a stabbing pain in her side that makes her stop, and when she turns to look down there's bone jutting out of her, and she's not sure who's it is. 

“Tiny thing.” His voice is deep, and it makes her skin crawl. Maybe literally, who knows what on her is her own skin at this point. “Don't you want more?” She shovers her knife into one of his throats and it doesn't shut him up which is just rude if anything. “Don't you want to big? Don't you want to be free?” 

“I want you-” She grunts in exertion as she carves through his ribcage and something tugs at her leg- something tugs at her leg hard. “To fucking leave!” Her leg pops out of the socket, and she howls with it. 

The swirl of meat on her leg keeps pulling. 

She feels things start to rip. 

She leaves a knife in his heart, and he doesn't stop. 

So she does it again and again and nothing- nothing- nothing- 

Muscles rend in her leg, and she shoves away from his chest, anything to find purchase and to kick the coil of pulsating muscle around her soon to be detached leg away. Fuck- Fuck- the pain alters to burning when something is definitely about to snap. It coils even tighter when she tries to kick at it, and she thinks maybe it'll snap the bones in her ankle too. 

“Do you need a door?” Melanie and the mass of meat stop and turn. The thing- the weird door thing that maybe hates Jon maybe hangs in the air, and a business lady stares down at her. Hopworth starts again, body undulating in horrific ways and Melanie looks up at the business lady before the undulation reaches the coil around her leg. 

“Yeah- fuck-” Something cuts into her hand and pulls just as hard, arm out of the socket before she's face first in some equally disgusting carpet. No meat though. No fat, no fresh blood, no muscle or bone jutting out of her. Everything hurts, and her adrenaline crash might actually kill her, but at least she's not going to die there. “Thanks.” 

There's no one around, just a weird corridor with dark walls and ugly... paintings? Melanie slowly rises back up to her feet wincing when she steps down on her left. They are paintings, she's pretty sure, just under such a thin plane of glass that they almost look like photographs in the dim... natural light of this hallway with no doors or windows or lights. 

“Huh.” She says and grips her bleeding arm before taking a very deep breath and with the rest of her remaining strength shoving it back into place. 

She doesn't conceal the yelp of pain.

“Hello.” The thing appears by her side- no it stepped out of the mirror near her- and it's long. Pulled out like a clay man. No features really, just sharp horrific fingers and oversized hands. 

“Hi.” She swallows. Looking at it hurts. Really feels like it's frying her brain. 

“It was here to kill the Archivist.” It says without a mouth, walking around her and backing her into a wall. 

“Jon's in a coma.” Probably a coma. He could just be legally brain dead. What's the difference, at this point?

“Yes.” It says. “I've noticed.” 

“Right.” She swallows nothing. “So is this the part where I try and fight you or...?” 

“Without your knives?” It asks, a slightly tilt of the head. A smile that isn't there, faintly seared into Melanie's mind. 

“Ah.” She says. “I did- did leave them. In him.” 

“You did. Where would they be without you.” 

“In a coma.” 

“Yes. You weren't there. During the unknowing.” Its hand traces a thin line along Melanie's arm, more blood spilling out and dripping down on to the carpet. “Little angry thing like you would have- well. Who knows how the Slaughter would have played there.” 

Melanie frowns. 

“So what then, now you eat me?” 

“Oh. No.” It reaches past her, and Melanie stumbles back into the now meatless lounge of the Archives. “I'm already full.” 

The door closes unceremoniously, and Melanie looks around. She's the only disgusting thing in the room, not even a speck of red on the ceiling. Her leg still hurts. The new cut on her arm hasn't stopped bleeding. 

Huh.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> catch me howling about how the "to have your who torn bloody from your what" applies to both of them 
> 
> (also theres another chapter shh its fine let it happen its okay)

Basira tells Melanie that the thing was the Distortion, that it calls itself Helen now, and that it maybe likes or hates Jon depending entirely on if Jon likes or hates it.  
  
Melanie has no idea why anyone would base their self-worth on anything Jon has ever said, but she shrugs it off. Once she's healed up, relatively, as healed up as whatever monster she is now can be healed up, she goes back to taking her walks around the tunnels. It's not like she can just leave the Institute anymore.   
  
What if more sentient meat decides its wants to fist fight a coma patient after all.   
  
Someone has to defend... the building. And since their pet cop is dead, it's her job. Because that. That tracks.   
  
Her life is a joke.   
  
Which, in any other circumstance would be worse then it is now. Because it's infuriating, and infuriating is good. It's a rush of adrenaline that can save her or save Basira, and that's good because she's being useful, she's doing her part. She should have killed Elias when she had the chance, but that's neither here nor there.   
  
She asks Basira to buy her more knives, and when Basira leaves, she walks around the tunnels. Her cot is tucked into a little alcove a good distance from Basira's because that's what Basira decided and considering the tunnels go on for a few miles, that's fine as well. She's not one to complain really. Never has been. No one's ever bothered to ask her her opinion on things, but who cares.

It's usable.  
  
There's a faded yellow door pushed into the dirt wall that's misaligned from the others by a few inches. Like someone's dug it out wrong.   
  
She knows what the door is and where it leads and takes a respectful, full berth around that entire section because she is nothing if not respectful. 

  
…

  
It's easy to get mad usually, but when she stares at Martin talking to an empty office, she can feel the anger.   
  
It's a physical, gripping thing, coiling around her spine and tightening. Her hands itch, almost hurt with it, and she goes off to find something to sink her rage into. Not here. Not where Lukas can see her.   
  
It isn't for him.

He doesn't deserve it.  
  
The yellow door is still there, and Melanie paces in front of it, going through all of what she knows about the thing inside. Dangerous, smug, fast, sad, confused and miserable. God, that's just all of them, isn't it?   
  
“Is there a point to the pacing?” Melanie jumps. The thing looks human, business casual, as it leans out of its door.   
  
“Not really.”   
  
“Fascinating.”   
  
“What's your deal with Jon?” She doesn't know where the question comes from, and neither does the thing.   
  
“The Archivist and I have a-” It stops, almost searching for a word and its voice is unmistakably sad. Melanie didn't know monsters could get sad. “Strained. Relationship.”   
  
One step removed from a Facebook status.   
  
“Right yeah.” Melanie nods quietly. “I'm going to punch you now.”   
  
“I've never been punched before.” The business lady says. “I'm sure this is going to be nothing short of an enlightening experience.”   
  
“Cool.”   
  
And she does.   
  
Business Lady's skin warps to accommodate Melanie's fist in its face and Melanie recoils, yanking her hand back. She watches as a few stands of not skin trail after her.   
  
There was nothing in the gap her hand left.  
  
“I was right. Enlightening.” It calls after her as Melanie runs down the tunnels and back into the Institute, away, away, away.

  
...

  
“They- he- stabbed me!” She howls, anesthetic wearing off and the pain of amateur surgery becoming almost too daunting to bear, even curled up like she is in the open corridor. “Cut me open-” She can barely form the words, tears pouring in a way she hasn't been able to make them in months. “Jon didn't even fucking ask!”   
  
“The Archivist never does.” Helen's long and confusing body leans against one the wall she's rocking against. “You gave as good as you got.”   
  
There's no unnatural adrenaline to catch her as she crashes and the pain from having something pulled out of her rocks her entire body. She reaches over, blindly if anything, eyesight too clouded by the tears to think about what she's doing and presses her face into Helen's leg.   
  
A wave of revulsion rolls down her spine and almost blots the pain out for a few moments.   
  
Her leg doesn't feel like skin. It feels like someone's very bad attempt at skin, too cold and too slick and still tacky somehow. Like leather vinyl.  
  
But Melanie doesn't have anything better anymore, so she moves her hurt leg carefully, lays it flat on the carpet and hugs Helen's leg again. None of the bones are where they're supposed to be, if those hard things she's feeling even are bones. But it's closeness, and it's comfort, and it's things she hasn't allowed herself in months.   
  
In years.   
  
Sharp jagged things that could be bones in Helen's palm pat the top of her head in the closest thing she'll get to a 'there-there' and Melanie sinks into every single touch. And it's so easy too. Helen is her friend- she's always been nothing but supportive.   
  
Melanie stretches her hands up, wrapping them around Helen's tiny waist and pulling her down lower so it could be a real hug and Helen crumples with no resistance, jagged shoulder digging into Melanie's chin.   
  
“It hurts.” She's whining now- and Helen sighs, placing a massive hand over the hole Jon left in her leg. “Ah- Ah-” She can feel the flesh twist and coil and knit itself back together until the only line remains there is a tight bunch of flesh that makes Melanie's head spin when she finally glances down at it.   
  
“I know,” Helen says and presses her empty face to Melanie's cheek, her tenderness so pervasive it echoes through the corridors.   
  
It echoes through Melanie's bones.  
  
Her leg still aches, but it's so easy to forget it now. Not the slow glowing embers of rage in her gut at Jon, at Basira for letting it happen, but the pain, the invasion, the theft of what it was, of what she was.   
  
“I-”   
  
“The Archivist thought he was helping,” Helen says. “He's rather miserable at it. Exceptionally good at crippling himself, though.”   
  
“God.” Melanie presses against sharpness harder, tucking her face into Helen's thin neck. “I'm sorry.”   
  
Helen shushes her and rubs her back.

"It's not in your nature to apologize."

Melanie thinks that if she could, Helen would be smiling.   
  
When she settles in for the night, a yellow door just a few inches from her cot, she doesn't mind that her shirt's but turned to ribbons.

**Author's Note:**

> comments are always encouraged and very very very appreciated
> 
> talk[ to me here](http://iamalivenow.tumblr.com/)


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